San José, CA – On Friday, Dec. 2, the U.S. Department of Labor said that the official unemployment rate fell to 8.6% in November, from 9.0% in October. Despite being the lowest unemployment rate since March of 2009, the fall in the unemployment rate was mainly due to the more than 400,000 jobless workers who gave up looking for work and were no longer counted as unemployed.

_Second of four-part series _

Editor’s note: This is the second article of a four-article series. The first article was titled, “ Who are the one percent?” This article describes the working class, who make up most of the 99%. The next article will be about the rest of the 99% who aren’t part of the working class. The last article will talk about how the history of racism and national oppression is important to understanding what is behind the 1%-99% divide and how the 1% enriches itself while maintaining its privilege and power.

San José, CA – On Sept. 13, the Census Bureau released their annual report on income, poverty, and health insurance in the United States. The report said that the number of people below the official poverty line rose from 14.3% in 2009 to 15.1% in 2010. This meant that 2.6 million more people fell into poverty last year, and the total of 46.2 million poor was the largest number in more than 50 years of records. Worst hit were African Americans (27.4% below the official poverty line), Latinos (26.6%), and children (22.0%).

San José, CA – In a sign that the economy is on the edge of another downturn, the Labor Department reported on Sept. 2 that there was no gain in jobs in August. Not counting last summer when there were large layoffs of temporary Census workers, this is the worst jobs report since February of 2010. The Labor Department also revised down the job gains for June and July, so that average job gain over the last three months was only 35,000 net new jobs per month. This is far below the 200,000 or so jobs that a normal recovery would be generating at this stage of an economic expansion.

San José, CA – On August 5, Standard and Poors, commonly known as S&P, downgraded U.S. government bonds from the highest rating AAA to the second-highest AA+. At the same time the S&P called for even more austerity, saying that $4 trillion in cuts in U.S. government spending were needed, not the $2 trillion agreed upon earlier in the week. S&P criticized the U.S. government for not making cuts in Social Security and Medicare. In addition, S&P said that the federal government spending cuts needed to come sooner, increasing the chances of a new downturn in the economy, or the feared ‘double-dip’ recession.

San José, CA – The recent federal debt limit deal passed by the House and Senate and signed into law by president Obama promises at least $2.1 trillion in spending cuts and lower interest payments over the next ten years. This deal did not include any savings from ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, or from restoring higher taxes for the rich. It was a victory for the Tea Party-backed Republicans and benefits the rich and Wall Street. At the same time programs serving poor and working people will be the target for cuts and the deal opens the door for cuts in Social Security and Medicare.

Spending cuts will hurt weak economy

This is the fifth in a series. See parts one, two, three, and four.

The recession ain’t over yet, fears of a ‘double-dip’ rise

San José, CA – On July 29, the Commerce Department released its report on Gross Domestic Product or GDP for the Second Quarter (April to June) of 2011. GDP, which measures the value of goods and services produced in the United States, rose at only a 1.3% annual rate, much slower than most mainstream economists expected. Even worse, the First Quarter (January to March) economic growth was cut from an earlier estimate of 1.9% to just 0.4%.

The Congressional Progressive Caucus proposal is good but could be better

San José, CA – A proposal for a federal budget that serves working people and not the rich and corporations needs to include four points. First, a budget proposal for the people needs to recognize that the biggest economic problem right now is not the federal budget deficit, but rather an unemployment rate of almost 10% more than two years after the recession officially ended. Second, given the fact that the public debt is mainly due to wars, tax cuts for the wealthy and recessions, balancing the budget must be done in a way that cuts military spending, raises taxes on the well-to-do and increases spending in the short run to get more people back to work. Third, future funding problems for Social Security and Medicare must protect the programs by increasing funding, not by cutting back on the safety net for seniors.

The House Republican proposal to “Cut, Cap, and Balance”

This is the second in a series. See parts one, three, four and five.

San José, CA – On July 8, the U.S. Department of Labor released its report on unemployment and new job creation for the month June. The report said that the unemployment rate rose for the third month in a row to 9.2%, while only 18,000 new jobs were created. The job creation was much worse than most mainstream economists expected, and was less than one-tenth as many new jobs as in February, March and April. The number of new jobs created in May was revised down from a weak 54,000 to an even worse 25,000.

This is the first in a series. See parts two, three, four and five.

San José, CA – In the first week of June, two important reports showed a sharp slowdown in the U.S. economy. On Friday, June 3, the Department of Labor said that unemployment in May rose to 9.1%, while only 54,000 new jobs were created, far less than what mainstream economists were predicting. Two days earlier, on June 1, a report on home prices showed another drop of 4.2% in the first three months of 2011, bringing home prices to a new low since the housing market began to tank in 2006.

San José, CA – More than 300 people packed the San Jose Buddhist Church hall on Feb. 20 to attend the 31st annual Day of Remembrance event in San Jose. This event commemorates Executive Order 9066 that was issued on Feb. 19, 1942 and which led to the incarceration of 120,000 Japanese Americans in U.S. concentration camps during World War II. The theme of the event was “Fighting Against Fear” which made connections the Japanese American experience during WWII and the attacks on Arab Americans and American Muslims today. The San Jose Day of Remembrance was organized by the Nihonmachi Outreach Committee (NOC), a grassroots community organization that was formed in the late 1970s out of concerns about the impact of corporate redevelopment on historic Japanese American communities.

San José, CA – On Jan. 25, 75 people rallied in front of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Library and then marched through downtown San José and by the federal building. The march and rally was organized by the South Bay Committee Against Political Repression. The rally was one of many that took place across the U.S., in response to the FBI and Grand Jury witch hunt that has been unleashed on anti-war and Palestine solitary activists.

San José, CA – On Nov. 18, Republicans in the House of Representatives blocked an attempt by the House Democrats to extend funding for Federal Unemployment Insurance, which expires on Nov. 30. If funding is not extended, almost a million jobless workers will be cut off from their benefits immediately. Over a million more will lose their benefits by the end of December.

San José, CA – On Oct. 8, the Department of Labor reported that local public schools had cut 49,800 jobs in September. Included in the layoffs this fall was kindergarten teacher Amanda VanNess, who stood with President Obama when he signed a bill giving $26 billion to local schools in August of 2009. While this federal stimulus money did save Ms. VanNess’ job in the Toledo (Ohio) Public School District in 2009, she was laid off this fall as the district’s drop in students led to another round of cuts.

San Jose, CA – More than 80 people gathered at the San Jose Buddhist Church Oct. 22 to learn about U.S. Army First Lieutenant Ehrin Watada, the first commissioned officer to refuse deployment to Iraq. Lieutenant Watada’s father, Bob Watada, and his wife, Rosa Sakanishi, explained the Lieutenant’s opposition to the war, which is both illegal and unjust. Also in the program were Reverend Gerald Sakamoto of the San Jose Buddhist Church, Dennis Kyne, a veteran of the first invasion of Iraq in 1991, the singing group Anne and the Vets and Reverend Motoe Yamada of the Wesley United Methodist Church.

San José, CA – On July 22 the House of Representatives voted 272-152 to extend the Federal Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) and Extended Benefits (EB) programs and President Obama signed the extension into law. This came the day after the Senate passed the extension by a 59-39 vote.

_Senate Democrats Promise an Extension Next Week But Nothing is Said About 99ers _

San José, CA – On July 15, the U.S. Department of Labor reported that another 250,000 unemployed were cut from federal unemployment insurance rolls. In the last three weeks alone, almost one million unemployed people were cut from the Federal Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) and Extended Benefits (EB) programs. These programs provide benefits for people out of work for more than six month who can no longer collect state unemployment insurance benefits.